HD DVD Bourne Identity looks GREAT! - Page 4

Man I hope it looks good because I was very disappointed with The Bourne Supremacy.

got this today from BB since i had some reward zone money to use...watching it now and it does look pretty good.

So far I think it looks better than Supremacy, but I'm only about 50 mins into it.

I think it looks outstanding!

Just grabbed a couple shots for now, would like to take more but the camera batteries crapped out on me! I know these belong in the SS thread, but what the hell.




-derek

How does the Bourne Identity compare as a movie to the Bourne Supremacy? I have BI coming in the mail, but I'd like to know how it compares. I enjoyed BS, but the HD-DVDs are my first experience with both films, and it'd be great if most people felt BI was a better film.

How come? I think it's a pretty solid transfer.

BI>BS

I think Beatboys cred went from 0 to -1

You HAVE to look at his Weeds review on the BD forum. He says S2 is as good as S1, and a bunch of BD people are all over him saying S1 was crap.

Please stop doing reviews Beat, the gig is up. Bourne looks great, and you blew it on weeds as well. 0-2 and the week is young.

I thought Bourne Identity looks awesome on HD-DVD. The only thing they could have done is add the TrueHD sound, then it would be perfect.

There is definitely something wrong with my copy of BI that I picked up today. The problem appears to be what I would call a moire pattern in certain scenes. For example, when he gets off the boat in the opening part of the movie and crosses the railroad track, there is an alternating light dark pattern the length of the track. Same thing on straight horizontal lines of buildings etc.
I compared the output of the standard dvd, upconverted on my HD-A1 and the pattern wasn't there. I also compared the output of BS and didn't see anything unusual so I'm pretty sure it's the new disk.
Anyone else?

Ok I finished watching. Overall it really was excellent. As far as "dirt" on the film, the only time I saw anything that looked liked that was at 1:49:20, in a shot of the white house. It almost appeard to be stock footage, older. I'd venture to say that those few seconds likely looked the same way in theaters.

I did notice ocassional white specks. not sure what they were. example was 08:20 in the upper left edge and another at 1:42:31. I admit I was looking for defects since someone mentioned "dirt". This looks more like digital noise or maybe a pinprick hole in the film or something. They only last 1 frame, and it's not "dirt". We could nit-pick transfers to death all day long if we wanted. I think I noticed 5 or 6 of these thru the whole film. Chances are if I had just sat down to watch the movie, I might have only noticed one or 2.

I'd have to give PQ a 4.98 out of 5. Very faithful to the film version.
Sound was 5/5

And of course it's one of the best movies I've seen in along time. Can't wait for the third movie to come out

This is such an obvious buy. I think I've watched the SD DVD 5 or 6 times over the last couple years. Glad to finally have the HD-DVD.

I just re-watched that section, I didn't notice what you described at all. I'm using an HD-XA2 output set to 1080p.

Is anyone having trouble with the last chapter before the credits, chapter 19 I think? I can't fast-forward or rewind, or even pause. And for some odd reason, the English subtitles turned on in this chapter. It's really distracting and I can't finish the damn movie cuz of this. I tried resetting the player a few times, but it keeps happening in the same chapter. This is a brand new disc straight from Best Buy.

Just watched it myself, on a A1. Great fun to see this good movie in HD finaly. :-)

Only possible dirt I saw ( that was not likely to be grain of film or the mentioned older film stock.) was in the Universal logo at the begging.) I suppose they could have done some clean up, but that would take away the feeling of watching a film, which is what I felt the whole time. I did not see any EE when I was looking for it. ( the location titles would have been an easy check).

The only issue I came across is that I needed to change resolutions from 720 to 1080i, my projector being 720, that is usually the best settings, but this seems to be one of those movies ( like I heard Children of men is) that the scaling to 720 is not as good as most. It produced very obvious scaling artifacts, This might be what the poster above is seeing. I suggest all who are watching on a 720P display to do a sanity check on this movie like you might have too on Children of Men as well. ( the difference in this movie was quite noticeable, but movies like serenity seem to be fine when set to 720P.

I would like to hear a bit of feed back from those who have a A20 to see if they see the same issue when watching this disc on a 720P display with 720P set as the resolution. ( to see if the scaling chip is indeed doing the scaling down or if it is still done in software. )

Thanks!

Not much better. In fact I've done A/B comparisons with several SD Legacy DD discs and compared them with Universals 1.5 DD+ and couldn't tell a difference.

Universal really dropped the ball on this one. It appears they have changed their stance on TrueHD with several of their recently announced titles having TrueHD. Therefore I'll withold judgement at this time.

Don't be surprised to see the trilogy released in a boxed set with this title offering a TrueHD track to sucker us all into buying it twice.

I find it quite entertaining that he has been announcing releases from FOX for 6 months now... none of which materialized.

Watched my copy last night. PQ is a solid 4.7/5, AQ is simply stunning in DD+, 5 stars easily. No glitches, what a great job, well done Universal!

He also gave Waiting... a 5/5 for PQ, ignoring (or not seeing) obvious noise in certain scenes. See the review thread for what highdefdigest (and a few forum members) noticed, but beatboy missed.

If you couldn't tell the difference between DD, at presumably 448 kb, and DD+, at 1.5 Mb, why do you think TrueHD, at 3Mb, would cause a noticeable improvement? I believe DD+ at 3Mb is in the specs. So, if that was the bitrate, do you think those extra bits would be audible? I appreciate the desire for lossless audio codecs but I think the benefits are largely psychological.

watched it last night too. excellent PQ and AQ. I'll be watching it again along with Supremacy before heading to the theater next Friday night...

I wonder where beatboy is now.

THE BOURNE ULTIMATUM REVIEW FROM HOLLYWOOD REPORTER




The Bourne Ultimatum
Bottom Line: A natural Bourne boxoffice killer.
By Kirk Honeycutt
Jul 25, 2007

Matt Damon returns for the third time as the amnesiac assassin.
"The Bourne Ultimatum," the culminating film of the trilogy begun five years ago with "The Bourne Identity," gets under way with a burst of nervous energy and extreme urgency and never lets up. It's a 114-minute chase film, dashing through streets and rooftops of any number of international urban sprawls with Matt Damon's redoubtable Jason Bourne hot on the trail of -- himself. That might be the genius of the series: A James Bond-like character who can escape any pickle and thwart any villain, but all in a quest for his own identity. Jason is not out to save the world -- though he might do that -- he'd just like to know his real name.

Director Paul Greengrass, who only made the astonishing "United 93" in the interim, returns for his second "Bourne" film (after 2004's "The Bourne Supremacy") to bring the roller coaster ride to an end in a dead heat where all the plot points and (surviving) characters of the three films converge. Audiences will eat it up: This is a postmillennial spy-action movie pitched to a large international audience. You hardly need subtitles.

The cool thing about this movie is that the real revenge is not against bad guys in the CIA, but against the high-tech world that maddens mere mortals. Your mobile phone drops calls? Your car needs towing after a parking-lot fender-bender? Well, Jason can switch phones and patch into the world from trains, subways, stairwells and undergrounds. Any car he steals leaps up sharp inclines, plunges off of roofs or smashes into other vehicles until reduced to smoldering metal yet can still outrace any car on the block.

And his body! Blow it up with a bomb, expose it to brutal hand-to-hand combat or throw it into the East River, and it gets up with a few manly scratches.


Yes, there are a few plot holes. But few are likely to care. A smart cast of veteran actors gives the film just enough emotional heft to carry you through the silliness. Damon has definitely made Bourne his own. For all his physical dexterity and killing instincts, Damon brings a Hamlet-like quality to the CIA-trained assassin suffering from a five-year spell of amnesia who can never quite tell who his friends are, or rather, which of his enemies might be a true friend.

Joan Allen returns as the CIA investigator who has slowly come to see that Jason might be the real deal. And Julia Stiles as an in-over-her-head agent again shows up for no credible reason other than the producers want her back. (They're right.)

Newcomers include a flinty and increasingly antsy David Strathairn as a head of a black-ops program that has its real-life model in all the extralegal programs sponsored by the current administration. At one point, he declares "you can't make this stuff up," and you know the filmmakers are nodding toward today's Washington.

Scott Glenn appears as a law-ignoring CIA director, though he might remind you more of the current attorney general, and Albert Finney crops up toward at the end as a Dr. Mengele figure behind a behavior-mod program that created any number of Jason Bournes.

The movie swings through Moscow (filched from the previous film); Paris; Turin, Italy; London; Madrid; Tangiers, Morocco; and New York as Jason hones in on who did this to him. (That's another thing -- he never has to endure airport security checks!)

A fatigue factor sets in somewhere; it might vary from person to person. Yet the sharp intelligence behind the screenplay by Tony Gilroy, Scott Z. Burns and George Nolfi (though other hands reportedly contributed) gives the plot, salvaged from the Robert Ludlum Cold War spy novel, a genuine buoyancy. The film is trying to get at something, no matter how crudely, about corruption within the American espionage system, with its secret reliance on renditions and torture in the name of freedom. This might not be the best way to illustrate the problem with credibility-stretchers at every turn. But then again, how many people look at documentaries?

Greengrass tops himself with each passing minute by staging terrific stunts and chases through crowded streets, buildings and rooftops. Cinematographer Oliver Wood and editor Christopher Rouse gives the film its lightning speed and jagged edges with a close, hand-held camera and quick edits while John Powell's score pulsates pure adrenaline.

THE BOURNE ULTIMATUM
Universal Pictures
Universal Pictures in association with MP Beta Prods. presents a Kennedy/Marshall production in association with Ludlum Entertainment
Credits:
Director: Paul Greengrass
Screenwriters: Tony Gilroy, Scott Z. Burns, George Nolfi
Screen story: Tony Gilroy
Based on the novel by: Robert Ludlum
Producers: Frank Marshall, Patrick Crowley, Paul L. Sandberg
Executive producers: Jeffrey M. Weiner, Henry Morrison, Doug Liman
Director of photography: Oliver Wood
Production designer: Peter Wenham
Costume designer: Shay Cunliffe
Music: John Powell
Editor: Christopher Rouse
Cast:
Jason Bourne: Matt Damon
Nicky Parsons: Julia Stiles
Noah Vosen: David Strathairn
Ezra Kramer: Scott Glenn
Sam Ross: Paddy Considine
Paz: Edgar Romeriz
Pamela: Joan Allen
Dr. Hirsch: Albert Finney
Running time -- 114 minutes
MPAA rating: PG-13

DD+ at high bitrate is still not enough. and people who do not agree with that are simply not movie lovers. they are just blinded by a format war. and it is obvious i am not the only who is complaining about it. because paramount start to releasing soon with lossless too.

the reason i say DD+ is ****** is because they could have done better. i know it. you know it. so why accept it so easy?

just to open your eys a bit. Universal can release the Last Starfighter from the 80ties with lossless audio, but can not release bourne indendity from a few years ago with lossless audio.

very logical ofcourse.............not!!!

I don't think HD-DVD needs LPCM, but Dolby TrueHD is nice (lossless), and does have it's best use in action movies. You don't really need truehd resolution audio in a chick flick with people talking or bawling.

No, I do not think there would be a difference at 3mbps. The bit rate of the master is even more important than the bitrate of compressed audio. Dolby will even be the first ones to tell you that there isn't a difference between 640kbps and 1.5kbps. In my own blind testing, comparing 448kbps legacy DD to 1.5 DD+ there is little to no difference. Comparing TrueHD to the 448kbps legacy DD or the DD+ track is night and day. Assuming a moderate to high end system, lossless provides sounds and reflections you were unable to hear before, the dynamic range will be greater, bass will be tighter and deeper, dialog will have greater clarity, and highs will be pristine and clear.

IMHO, studios should be obligated to give consumers HD sound in an HD release. If they give us HD picture and no HD sound, the disc should be half priced. Don't settle for yesterdays sound in todays media.

Reminds me of the saying, "It is better to keep one's mouth shut and be thought a fool than to open it and remove all doubt."

Ohh yeah you're absolutely right... I better get rid of all my DVD movies because they aren't lossless. The LOTR extended editions are absolutely worthless because they only have DTS 754 kbps.

But while you may claim I'm not a movie lover because I like LOTR even at SD and DTS 754 kbps for the moment, I hope you enjoy not watching any movies that aren't available on HDM.

and you are blinded by spec numbers. Of course anything could be better. If I take your stance then I should post "compressed video is ******, it could be better if they give use uncompressed video, better yet give the 35mm print and the multitrack master"

Just got finished viewing this movie for the first time ever and I'm very glad I waited to view it on HD DVD. This movie rocked! It looked great and even though the sound was "only" DD+ it blew me away, it sounded better then tons of lossless tracks I've ever heard. And best overall the movie was very good. Can't wait to view part 2 tonight.

I wouldn't even consider watching BS without seeing BI........they MUST go together.